Selma premiered at the American Film Institute Festival on November 11, 2014, began a limited US release on December 25, and expanded into wide theatrical release on January 9, 2015, two months before the 50th anniversary of the march. The film got a re-release on March 20, 2015 in the honor of the 50th anniversary of the historical march.

King, other SCLC leaders, and black Selma residents march to the registration office to register. After a confrontation in front of the courthouse a shoving match occurs as the police go into the crowd. Cooper fights back, knocking Sheriff Jim Clark to the ground, leading to the arrest of Cooper, King, and others.

Alabama Governor George Wallace speaks out against the movement. Coretta meets with Malcolm X, who says he will drive whites to ally with King by advocating a more extreme position. Wallace and Al Lingo decide to use force at an upcoming night march in Marion, Alabama, using state troopers to assault the marchers. A group of protesters runs into a restaurant to hide, but troopers rush in, beat and shoot Jimmie Lee Jackson. King and Bevel meet with Cager Lee, Jackson's grandfather, at the morgue. King speaks to ask people to continue to fight for their rights. King receives harassing phone calls with a recording of sexual activity implied to be him and another woman leading to an argument with Coretta. King is criticized by members of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC).

As the Selma to Montgomery march is about to begin, King talks to Young about cancelling it, but Young convinces King to persevere. The marchers, including John Lewis of SNCC, Hosea Williams of SCLC, and Selma activist Amelia Boynton, cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge and approach a line of state troopers who put on gas masks. The troopers order the marchers to turn back, and when they hold their ground the troopers attack with clubs, horses, tear gas, and other weapons. Lewis and Boynton are among those badly injured. The attack is shown on national television as the wounded are treated at Brown Chapel, the movement's headquarter church.

Movement attorney Fred Gray asks federal Judge Frank Minis Johnson to let the march go forward. President Johnson demands that King and Wallace stop their actions, and sends John Doar to convince King to postpone the next march. White Americans, including Viola Liuzzo and James Reeb, arrive to join the second march. Marchers cross the bridge again and see the state troopers lined up, but the troopers turn aside to let them pass. King, after praying, turns around and leads the group away, and again comes under sharp criticism from SNCC activists. That evening, Reeb is beaten to death by a white mob on a street in Selma.

Production

Development

Filmmaker Ava DuVernay, who was the second choice to direct the film.

On June 18, 2008, Variety reported that screenwriter Paul Webb had written an original story about Martin Luther King Jr. and Lyndon B. Johnson for Celador's Christian Colson, which would be co-produced with Brad Pitt's Plan B Entertainment.[29] In 2009, Lee Daniels was reportedly in early talks to direct the film, with financing by Pathé. Dede Gardner and Jeremy Kleiner of Plan B joined as co-producers along with participation of Cloud Eight Films.[30] In 2010, reports indicated that The Weinstein Company would join Pathe and Plan B to finance the $22 million film,[31] but by the next month Daniels had signed on with Sony to re-write and direct The Butler.[32] In an interview in August 2010, Daniels said that financing was there for the Selma project, but he had to choose between The Butler and Selma, and chose The Butler.[33]

In July 2013, it was announced that Ava DuVernay had signed on to direct the film for Pathé UK and Plan B, and that she was revising the script with the original screenwriter, Paul Webb.[34][35] DuVernay estimated that she re-wrote 90 percent of Webb's original script.[36] Those revisions included rewriting King's speeches, because, in 2009, King's estate licensed them to DreamWorks and Warner Bros. for an untitled project to be produced by Steven Spielberg. Subsequent negotiations between those companies and Selma's producers did not lead to an agreement. DuVernay drafted alternative speeches that evoke the historic ones without violating the copyright. She recalled spending hours listening to King's words while hiking the canyons of Los Angeles. While she did not think she would "get anywhere close to just the beauty and that nuance of his speech patterns", she did identify some of King's basic structure, such as a tendency to speak in triplets (saying one thing in three different ways).[37][38] In early 2014, Oprah Winfrey came on board as a producer along with Pitt,[39] and by February 25 Paramount Pictures was in final negotiations for the US and Canadian distribution rights.[40] On April 4, 2014, it was announced that Bradford Young would be the director of photography of the film.[41]

Filming

Alabama State troopers attack civil-rights demonstrators during the first attempt to march from Selma to Montgomery (historic photograph)

Principal photography began May 20, 2014, around Atlanta, Georgia.[47][48] Filming took place around Marietta Square[49] and Rockdale County Courthouse in Conyers. The Conyers scene involved a portrayal of federal judge Frank Minis Johnson, who ruled that the third and final march could go forward.[50] In Newton County, Georgia, filming took place at Flat Road, Airport Road, Gregory Road, Conyers, Brown, Ivy and Emory Streets, exteriors on Lee Street, outside shots of the old Newton County Courthouse, also shots of the Covington Square, and an interior night shoot at the Townhouse Café on Washington St.[51] In Alabama, scenes were shot in Selma, centering on the Bloody Sunday march to the Edmund Pettus Bridge, and at Montgomery, Alabama, where, in 1965, King led civil rights demonstrators down Dexter Avenue toward the Alabama State Capitol at the conclusion of the third march from Selma.[52]

Release

Selmapremiered in Grauman's Egyptian Theatre at AFI Fest on November 11, 2014, in Los Angeles[57] for which it received a standing ovation.[58] The film opened in limited release in the United States on December 25, 2014, including Los Angeles, New York City, and Atlanta,[59] before its wide opening on January 9, 2015.[60]

The film was screened in the Berlinale Special Galas section of the 65th Berlin International Film Festival in February 2015.[61] It was released by Pathé February 6, 2015 in the United Kingdom. Paramount Pictures gave the film a limited re-release in the US on March 20, 2015 to honor the march's 50th anniversary.[62]Selma was released on Blu-ray and DVD on May 5, 2015.[63]

Reception

Critical response

Selma received critical acclaim from critics, particularly for its acting and direction. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds a rating of 99%, based on 213 reviews, with an average rating of 8.7/10. The site's critical consensus reads: "Fueled by a gripping performance from David Oyelowo, Selma draws inspiration and dramatic power from the life and death of Martin Luther King, Jr. — but doesn't ignore how far we remain from the ideals his work embodied."[64] On Metacritic, the film has a score of 89 out of 100, based on 46 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".[65] According to CinemaScore, audiences gave the film a rare grade of "A+" on an A+ to F scale.[66]

Richard Roeper of the Chicago Sun Times praised the film as "an important history lesson that never feels like a lecture. Once school is back in session, every junior high school class in America should take a field trip to see this movie."[68]Joe Morgenstern, writing for The Wall Street Journal, wrote: "At its best, Ava DuVernay's biographical film honors Dr. King's legacy by dramatizing the racist brutality that spurred him and his colleagues to action."[69]A. O. Scott of The New York Times praised the acting, directing, writing, and cinematography, and wrote: "Even if you think you know what's coming, Selma hums with suspense and surprise. Packed with incident and overflowing with fascinating characters, it is a triumph of efficient, emphatic cinematic storytelling."[70]Peter Travers of Rolling Stone wrote: "DuVernay's look at Martin Luther King's 1965 voting-rights march against racial injustice stings with relevance to the here and now. Oyelowo's stirring, soulful performance as King deserves superlatives."[71]David Denby, writing for The New Yorker, wrote: "This is cinema, more rhetorical, spectacular, and stirring than cable-TV drama."[72] Ann Hornaday of The Washington Post gave the film four out of five stars, and wrote: "With Selma, director Ava DuVernay has created a stirring, often thrilling, uncannily timely drama that works on several levels at once ... she presents [Martin Luther King, Jr.] as a dynamic figure of human-scale contradictions, flaws and supremely shrewd political skills."[73]

Praise was not unanimous. Glen Ford, editor of Black Agenda Report, criticized the film as a product of the "conservative Black political worldview" of producer and star Oprah Winfrey, writing that it "insults Black SNCC civil rights heroes" but protects "the white, rich Kennedys".[74] Writing about why Selma was not nominated for more Academy Awards, Adolph Reed, Jr., political science professor at the University of Pennsylvania, opined that "now it's the black (haute) bourgeoisie that suffers injustice on behalf of the black masses."[75]

Historical accuracy

The historical accuracy of Selma's story has been the subject of controversy about the degree to which artistic license should be used in historical fiction.[77][78] The film was criticized by some for the omission of various individuals or groups historically associated with the Selma marches, while others challenged how particular historical figures in the script were represented. Most controversy in the media centered around the film's portrayal of President Johnson and his relationship with King. To people such as LBJ Presidential Library director Mark Updegrove[79] and Joseph A. Califano, Jr., Johnson was seen as a champion of civil rights legislation and a proactive partner of King, and they accused the film of falsely depicting Johnson as a reluctant or obstructionist political actor that had the FBI monitor and harass King.[80][81] Having served as Johnson's top domestic policy assistant (including on issues of civil rights) and as U.S. Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare, Califano questioned whether the writer and director felt "free to fill the screen with falsehoods, immune from any responsibility to the dead, just because they thought it made for a better story".[82]

Andrew Young—SCLC activist and official, and later US Congressman, Ambassador to the United Nations, and mayor of Atlanta—told The Washington Post that the depiction of the relationship between Johnson and King "was the only thing I would question in the movie. Everything else, they got 100 percent right."[83] According to Young, the two were always mutually respectful, and King respected Johnson's political problems.[83] On television, Young pointed out that it was US Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy who had signed the order which allowed the FBI to monitor King and other SCLC members and that it happened before Johnson took office.[84]

In addition to the controversy surrounding the film's depiction of President Johnson and other historical figures, some Jewish commentators have taken issue with the film for not mentioning the contribution of individual American Jews in the Civil Rights Movement or portraying specific Jewish clergy who were among the non-black supporters marching with King at Selma.[85]

Director DuVernay and US Representative John Lewis (whom the film portrays when a young man) responded separately that the film Selma is a work of art about the people of Selma, not a documentary. DuVernay said in an interview that she did not see herself as "a custodian of anyone's legacy".[86] In response to criticisms that she rewrote history to portray her own agenda, DuVernay said that the movie is "not a documentary. I'm not a historian. I'm a storyteller".[87] Lewis wrote in an op-ed for The Los Angeles Times: "We do not demand completeness of other historical dramas, so why is it required of this film?"[88]